Archive for the 'Music' Category
30/08/2014
Fantastic Man
Documentary investigating Nigerian musician William Onyeabor, a man shrouded in mystery and myth. The film tells the story of a label’s attempt to track William down, speaking to fans such as Damon Albarn, Caribou and Femi Kuti and travelling to Nigeria to meet those who’ve worked with him in a bid to uncover the truth about his story.
With a career spanning eight self-released albums from the mid-1970s to 80s, Onyeabor has been mysterious for his distinct, prolific synth-based sound, and his means of self-production, as he recorded and pressed his albums at his own studio, Wilfilms Ltd. With synthesizers already being a rare luxury at the time, and especially in Africa, many rumors circulate about Onyeabor and his financial connections, even speculating Russian ties.
alldayeveryday.com
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Tags: Jake Sumner
13/12/2012
Insen Live
The collaboration between pianist Ryuichi Sakamoto and electronic music wizard Alva Noto often yields beautiful sounds that defy categorization: not quite classical, not quite electronic, but living in some sort of meditative middle ground.
youtu.be
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Tags: Alva Noto, Ryuichi Sakamoto
30/05/2012
What the Future Sounded Like
Post-war Britain rebuilt itself on a wave of scientific and industrial breakthroughs that culminated in the cultural revolution of the 1960s. It was a period of sweeping change and experimentation where art and culture participated in and reflected the wider social changes. In this atmosphere was born the Electronic Music Studios (EMS), a radical group of avant-garde electronic musicians who utilized technology and experimentation to compose a futuristic electronic sound-scape for the New Britain.
ems-synthi.demon.co.uk
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Tags: Matthew Bate
25/05/2012
Eurovision’s Dirty Secret
Reporter Paul Kenyon finds out how the contest has been used as a tool of intimidation: viewers have been interrogated for voting for the nation’s long-term enemy, Armenia; a protest singer has been told to flee before Eurovision or he will be thrown in jail; and dozens have had their homes bulldozed to make way for the Eurovision event itself.
The US embassy in Baku has compared the ruling family to the Mafia. The regime has held onto power through a combination of rigged elections, jailing opponents, and by irregular control of the country’s vast oil wealth. So, why did the organisers of the world’s best-loved music event agree to host it in Azerbaijan?
bbc.co.uk
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Tags: BBC, Paul Kenyon
16/08/2011
Synth Britannia
Documentary following a generation of post-punk musicians who took the synthesiser from the experimental fringes to the centre of the pop stage.
In the late Seventies small pockets of electronic artists such as The Human League, Cabaret Voltaire and Throbbing Gristle were inspired by Kraftwerk and J G Ballard to dream of the sound of the future against the backdrop of bleak, high-rise Britain.
bbc.co.uk
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Tags: BBC
11/04/2011
Copyright Criminals
Copyright Criminals examines the creative and commercial value of musical sampling, including the related debates over artistic expression, copyright law, and (of course) money.
This documentary traces the rise of hip-hop from the urban streets of New York to its current status as a multibillion-dollar industry. For more than thirty years, innovative hip-hop performers and producers have been re-using portions of previously recorded music in new, otherwise original compositions. When lawyers and record companies got involved, what was once referred to as a “borrowed melody” became a “copyright infringement.” The film showcases many of hip-hop music’s founding figures like Public Enemy, De La Soul, and Digital Underground—while also featuring emerging hip-hop artists from record labels Definitive Jux, Rhymesayers, Ninja Tune, and more.
copyrightcriminals.com
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thepiratebay.org
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Tags: Benjamin Franzen, Independent Lens, Kembrew McLeod
27/01/2011
Foli: There Is No Movement Without Rhythm
Life has a rhythm, it’s constantly moving. The word for rhythm ( used by the Malinke tribes ) is FOLI. It is a word that encompasses so much more than drumming, dancing or sound. It’s found in every part of daily life.
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Tags: Thomas Roebers
27/12/2010
Krautrock: The Rebirth of Germany
Documentary which looks at how a radical generation of musicians created a new German musical identity out of the cultural ruins of war.
Between 1968 and 1977 bands like Neu!, Can, Faust and Kraftwerk would look beyond western rock and roll to create some of the most original and uncompromising music ever heard. They shared one common goal – a forward-looking desire to transcend Germany’s gruesome past – but that didn’t stop the music press in war-obsessed Britain from calling them Krautrock.
bbc.co.uk
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Tags: BBC
01/12/2010
Making Contact
In 2008 the Minus bandwagon embarked on a tour of proportions previously unheard of in electronic music. Celebrating the 10th anniversary of Richie Hawtin’s genre-defining label, the CONTAKT tour visited nine cities on three continents over the course of a year.
Insightful, captivating and genuinely funny at times, ‘MAKING CONTAKT’ is a tribute to the spirit of constant technological and artistic innovation that drives the Minus label and its creative mastermind, Richie Hawtin. The cinematic format of the tour documentary might be a well established genre in rock music, but with ‘MAKING CONTAKT’ Hawtin and Demirel have created the benchmark road movie for the techno generation.
discogs.com
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Tags: Ali M. Demirel, Richie Hawtin
27/04/2010
Lessons of Darkness
This film shows the disaster of the Kuwaitian oil fields in flames. In contrast to the common documentary film there are no comments and few interviews. What must have been the hell itself is presented to the viewer in such beautiful sights and beautiful music that one has to be fascinated by it.
imdb.com
rutracker.org
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Tags: Werner Herzog
18/03/2010
The ABC's of DADA
The Dada movement was a protest against the barbarism of World War I, the bourgeois interests that Dada adherents believed inspired the war, and what they believed was an oppressive intellectual rigidity in both art and everyday society. Dada was an international movement, and it is difficult to classify artists as being from any one particular country, as they were constantly moving from one place to another.
Dada was not art – it was “anti-art”. It was anti-art in the sense that Dadaists protested against the contemporary academic and cultured values of art. For everything that art stood for, Dada was to represent the opposite.
1 youtube.com
2 youtube.com
3 youtube.com
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22/11/2009
Home of the Brave: A Film by Laurie Anderson
Famed performance artist Laurie Anderson both directed and starred in the 90-minute concert film Home of the Brave. While the film refuses to “explain” Anderson to those unfamiliar with her work, it serves as a valuable primer, encouraging the uninitiated to do their own further research. Anderson’s non sequitur combinations of music and visuals can be very funny at times, but don’t make the mistake of dismissing her as a mere court jester. The film’s litmus test is its middle section; you’ll either revere or despise Anderson after experiencing this lengthy segment. Among the peripheral personalities in Home of the Brave is legendary self-destructive novelist William Burroughs.
The following pieces are performed in the film:
1. Good Evening (instrumental)
2. Zero and One (spoken word)
3. Excellent Birds
4. Old Hat (spoken word)
5. Drum Dance (instrumental)
6. Smoke Rings
7. Late Show (instrumental with vocal sample by William S. Burroughs)
8. White Lily (spoken word)
9. Sharkey’s Day
10. How to Write (instrumental with spoken word introduction by Won-sang Park)
11. Kokoku
12. Radar (instrumental with wordless vocalizations by Anderson)
13. Gravity’s Angel
14. Langue D’Amour
15. Talk Normal
16. Difficult Listening Hour (spoken word)
17. Language is a Virus
18. Sharkey’s Night
19. Credit Racket (instrumental)
imdb.com
en.wikipedia.org
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Tags: Laurie Anderson
14/05/2009
Dub Echoes
“Dub Echoes” is a documentary that traces the origins of the Jamaican dub music and it’s influence on the development of hip hop and electronic music.The film shows how the Jamaican invention called dub ended up influencing much of the music we hear today, from electronic music to hip-hop, transforming the studio in a musical instrument and giving way to all of sonic experiments.
imdb.com
dubechoes.com
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Tags: Bruno Natal
25/04/2009
High Tech Soul
HIGH TECH SOUL is the first documentary to tackle the deep roots of techno music alongside the cultural history of Detroit, its birthplace. From the race riots of 1967 to the underground party scene of the late 1980s, Detroit’s economic downturn didn’t stop the invention of a new kind of music that brought international attention to its producers and their hometown.
plexifilm.com
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video.google.com
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Tags: Plexfilm
24/01/2009
Modulations: Cinema for the Ear
Director Iara Lee explores the evolution of techno and electronica music throughout the 20th century in this illuminating musical documentary. Interspersing footage of revolutionary German pre-techno group Kraftwerk, modern avant garde composers like John Cage, European dance dj’s, and specific cultural phenomenons like the Prodigy and Afrika Bamambaataa, MODULATIONS is comprehensive and innovative. A must have for technophiles, ravers, and the digerati, this video features dozens of the best electronic musicians of the 20th century.
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Tags: Iara Lee
28/12/2008
Kraftwerk: Minimum - Maximum
This 20 track 2-DVD set is the first ever offical document of Kraftwerks’ legendary live show. Included are 2 hours of visually stunning live performances from the band’s 2004 world tour, filmed and recoreded with their legendary precision.
youtube.com
thepiratebay.org
Posted in Music | 1 Comment »
Tags: Kraftwerk
16/12/2008
Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance
This movie was designed to have no plot. Meaning is to be created by the viewer, and only the viewer can give value to the images and music. That said, there is a central idea behind the movie, and according to the director it is this: The greatest event in the history of mankind has occurred recently, and has been largely missed by both the media and academia. Beyond the headlines and every day crises of international events, a deeper shift in human affairs has occurred: Humanity no longer exists in the natural world, we are no longer connected to it. It is not that we are now users of technology, but rather that we exist within technology, we are part of it and it is part of us. The natural world now exists only to support the artificial one in which we live.
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Tags: Godfrey Reggio
12/12/2008
Bobby McFerrin: Spontaneous Inventions
This 1986 completely improvised one-man show at the Aquarious Theatre in Los Angeles is the essence of McFerrin’s magic. Using only his pliable voice and his body as percussion, McFerrin lets his fertile imagination and vast musical knowledge … Full Descriptionrun in free-association overdrive. Also included are two music videos McFerrin made in support of his Simple Pleasures album.
wikipedia.org
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Tags: Bud Schaetzle
29/11/2008
Music for One Apartment and Six Drummers
A gang in a Volvo have staked out a flat; when its occupants leave to walk their dog, the six break into the place. One keeps his eyes on a stopwatch: they have only ten minutes before the couple returns. Instead of stealing things, the gang goes from room to room making fascinating percussive music with found objects: first in the kitchen, then the bedroom, the bathroom, and the salon. Cabinet doors, pot lids, light switches, a pill dispenser, a lamp, books, and a vacuum cleaner hose all add to the suite in four movements. The drummers keep the first three rooms tidy, but what will the flat’s occupants make of the hurricane that hits the living room?
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Tags: Johannes Stjärne Nilsson, Ola Simonsson
03/11/2008
Bruce Haack: The King of Techno
A look into the underground world of Bruce Haack, a genius whose past work continues to garner recognition with time. The homespun musician couldn’t have done it without the support of his family, friends, lovers, and the neighborhood kids he called “starchildren,” all of whom paint the big picture of Bruce’s life legacy and so-called dimension of imagination. In addition, various musicians of many genres have joined in today showing worldwide support, thus contributing to Bruce’s objective, “Sure it’s nice to be famous, but I’m more interested in obtaining a telepathic following.” As for the music world, history’s future king is coming from the past.
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Posted in Documentary, Music | 1 Comment »
Tags: Philip Anagnos
Arno Skatas 